"Our mother is an educated woman, and has taken great pains with our education," said Sam in reply to a remark of Denison upon the subject. "And she has done as much for father. Our long winter nights we always spend in reading, music, and sometimes in such games as chess, backgammon, drafts, etc. Mother is a most splendid mathematician. She is also quite a linguist. But I am afraid that mother's days of teaching are over in this world. Dr. Jones is exceedingly kind, but do you really think that he has any hopes of curing her?" And the two sons looked anxiously into Denison's face as they awaited his reply. "Well," replied Denison slowly, as if carefully weighing his words, "I have known Dr. Jones more than twenty years very intimately, and I tell you candidly that you may rely implicitly upon his word. He is a physician of remarkable skill, and to my positive knowledge has cured several cases of cancer that had been, like your mother's, given up as incurable. So I should hope a great deal if he gives you encouragement." "God is good, and has heard our prayers," said Sam. While this party spent the day until the middle of the afternoon paddling from trap to trap, capturing three otters, and catching several dozen beautiful trout and black bass, the Doctor and the Professor ascended with Mr. Barton to the ship. As he passed through the elegant rooms of the cabin, and saw the wonderful degree of comfort, and even luxury, that our voyagers were enjoying, he cried out, like the Queen of Sheba, "The half was never told!" And the wonderful metal of which everything was composed where practicable--aluminum--excited his special interest. "Without this metal you could never have made the trip," he declared. But when he had mounted the spiral stairway, and was standing in the observatory, for some time he was speechless. As his eye ran up the shining mast, then off over the glistening sides of the globe to the earth, three hundred feet below, then away over the trackless wastes of Labrador, he finally exclaimed, "This, gentlemen, is too wonderful for me. I cannot give expression to my feelings. If you had told me that you were visitors from Venus or Mars, I should be obliged to believe you." And so they sat and discussed for an hour or more the object of the expedition, and the probability of success. All agreed that, so far as human thought and judgment could foresee, failure was hardly possible. They descended to the cabin. The aluminum mast especially attracted the attention of the old sailor. "And you intend erecting this magnificent spar at the North Pole!" he exclaimed, all his sailor instincts thoroughly aroused. "How do you intend to manage that business, Doctor?"